Easily the most obvious failing of Steam is the front page layout, which seems less devoted to promoting the most recent releases than it does big sellers. Along with a massive scrolling banner which flips between the most hyped new releases and AAAs, everything a user sees the moment they log in are games the Valve staff have personally picked out from the past several weeks. The actual new releases section is confined to an area beneath this, something which limits awareness for new titles and harms sales. Even accounting for the members of the community who take the time to check for new releases on a daily basis, the design severely limits that all important front page awareness which can mean the difference between a studio making profit and tanking in sales. Compared to the likes of GamersGate and GOG.com, Steam's front page is poorly structured out and counterproductive to promoting all of its releases equally. While both of those examples suffer from some of the same excesses as Steam, they are far more compactly designed and easier to navigate, allowing for new titles to have a far better chance of being noticed. Freeing up space by removing relatively useless add-ons such as Community Activity would allow for easier searching and more pertinent information - this could be anything from listing the year a game was originally released along with the developer, to even just giving a small indication which ones are a port from iOS.
A gamer who has played everything from Daikatana to Dwarf Fortress. An obsessive film fanatic valuing everything from The Third Man to Flash Gordon. An addict to tabletop titles, comics and the classics of science fiction, whatever media they are a part of.
